Caesar was a powerful titan destroyed by men fearing his tyranny. Here you will find opinions from a Think Tank of Americans with political views that span conservative to libertarian who agree that tyrants deserve to be destroyed, through sound arguments. We honor the ideals of the Founding Fathers and free market thinkers. "The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress." (Frederick Douglass - 1857)

Monday, August 01, 2005

We Defend What Is Ours

One of my thoughtful liberal co-worker friends opined that Iraqis just want the Americans to leave and for the war to end. Such is a sentiment of everyone. I think even the terrorists would agree.

However, the type of Iraq that would result would be a Sharia law similar to that as practiced by the Taliban in Afghanistan. It is quite clear to me given the massive turn-out for the Iraqi election and their continual recruitment of police and other government personnel, the Iraqis want their new country to be success that can defend themselves. I am confident that will happen in due time.

The opposition to this war in the West, largely made up of Leftists, fails to recognize that these insurgents are either Baathists formerly in favor under Saddam or are from outside of Iraq (like Zarqawi). The grand design to defeat terrorism is to develop investment by the Iraqi people into their security. Like our Founding Fathers, the fight for security is greatest when one is defending ones own property. Thus, the phrase “the ownership society” goes well beyond the field of economics. As Iraqis complete their draft of a constitution and ratify it, they will have invested enough time and blood to see it succeed.

In the 1940s the raging -ism in the Middle East was anti-Semitic secular fascism, copycatting Hitler and Mussolini — who seemed by 1942 ascendant and victorious. Between the 1950s and 1970s Soviet-style atheistic Baathism and tribal Pan-Arabism were deemed the waves of the future and unstoppable. By the 1980s Islamism was the new antidote for the old bacillus of failure and inadequacy. Each time an -ism was defeated, it was only to be followed by another — as it always is in the absence of free markets and constitutional government.

It is not the locals that are the problem. Hanson notes further:

Iraqi guardsmen are fighting al Qaedists as Afghans die in firefights with Taliban remnants. Note well that at the loci of American democratizing presence in Afghanistan and Iraq, there are few local Iraqis and Afghans — as there are few Turkish or Indian Muslims — who are eager for global jihad against the West. The killers instead flock from elsewhere to those new nations to stop the experiment before it spreads. Give dictatorial Pakistan or Egypt billions, and we get ever more terrorists; give the Iraqis and Afghans their freedom and their citizens are unlikely to show up in London and Madrid blowing up civilians, but rather busy at home killing jihadists.

A man will defend what he owns. Our stake in our family, our community, our country and our life is what forces us to go beyond what is our normal capacity for achievement. Hanson mentions how Muslims who are citizens in Israel are not the ones involved in suicide bombing. We have mentioned here in this blog before how few of these Israeli Muslims would ever agree to move from Israel to Palestine (or to any other Arab country). In Israel they have jobs, homes, education, the vote, free speech and a future. We all strive for happiness. It is not something that comes easy.

About Me

(ettubloge@yahoo.com) Neal is a former RI commercial fisherman (OK just a few trips) who went on to law school in NYC (passed the bar but should have stayed in RI as a fisherman), met a Brooklyn girl and married her (fuhgedaboudit) and is now a family man in NJ (how'd that happen?) who reacqainted himself with the wonders of individual liberty late in life. He devotes his free time to studying politics and economics, watching too much baseball, reading Philip Roth on the side and examining the hypocrisy of the ruling elites.